Restricting Reliable Energy Sources Is Expensive and Dangerous

Jason Hayes | 5.24.2021 1:30 PM

Government officials fail to serve citizens when their policies deliberately limit access to affordable, reliable energy sources like gasoline, natural gas, nuclear, or propane. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's campaign to close the Line 5 pipeline is one of the more pressing examples of this failure.

Unfortunately, this reality is hindering a growing number of American lives, as no reasonable alternatives exist for transportation fuels like gasoline or jet fuel, or for heating and cooking fuels like propane for rural households. The Line 5 pipeline , which crosses through the Great Lakes at the Straits of Mackinac between Michigan's upper and lower peninsulas, supplies 55 percent of the statewide demand for propane. It also supplies jet fuels for the Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport and several other airports throughout the region and crude oil that is refined into gasoline and other fuels at refineries in Michigan, Ohio, Ontario, and Quebec. 

While "shut it down" advocates often claim Line 5 is a Canadian pipeline that doesn't benefit the United States, a recent report by the Consumer Energy Alliance estimated that, if enforced, Whitmer's closure mandate will cost Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania $20.8 billion in economic activity, $2.4 billion in salaries and wages, and almost 34,000 jobs. Many American and Canadian government officials (from both sides of the political aisle), business interests, and labor union representatives have come out in favor of keeping the pipeline operating . They have also described their support for protecting the Great Lakes and retaining energy infrastructure by removing the pipeline from the water and moving it 100 feet below the lakebed to a cement-lined tunnel .

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